Learning Reflections in East Asia Religion, Essay Example

Introduction

Religion has been explained in many doctrines; hence there are no specific explanations or meanings about it. McGrath (2020) stated that religion is an individual belief to what if regarded as a sacred, spiritual, and divine experience. Moreover, it is a way in which human beings relate to their daily life and fate after death (McGrath, 2020). On the individual concept, religion is mainly studied through historical reading texts by comparing one religion to the other and knowing all the historical facts about religious practices. The historical knowledge acquired through books and cultural histories from the society one grew formed the basis and strengthened the individual religion. However, this religious belief could be challenged when one meets someone who considers a different religion and has different beliefs and cultures. The essay will explain more on the learning reflection of Confucianism, highlighting the two approaches that can be used to study religion and the five facts of Confucianism.

Confucianism Learning Reflection

An ethic that regulates human relationships and its primary purpose are to know how to act towards others. One of the quotations highlighted by Confucianism is, “when one attempts to direct the common people with arbitrary rules and to have them observe rules by punishing them, they will always evade and have no feeling of guilt. However, if one leads them with virtue and holds them in line ritually, they will observe the rules and correct them when wrong.” In Book Two, the classic explains that for a society to observe political order, one should imply the use of a forceful power and not the use of coercive or governmental laws. An example of such is Wu-Wei perfection appear in this book which includes the famous spiritual autobiography of Confucius in 2.4, and also a comprehensive discussion of the “heart” virtue of filial

The second quotation highlighted is whereby “a person who is good enough has nothing to do with ritual.” Using an example of someone has no obligation of relating to music if one is not good. The fact used to explain this is that of cultural refinement and native substance in book three. It states that if a person is not good, one can not perform the rite himself without the means of submission if the practice of music cannot be done. These would not be used to do good, even though one has several other gifts.

“Young people need to be respectful when they are at home and respectful to their elders when they are in public. Conscientious and private, they need to be generally concerned about the masses, but they have a special love for those who are good.” A good example is Confucius, who cited Yan Hui as the only person who was disciplined and loved learning. This fact is highlighted in book one on political order, which grows based on the moral characteristics formed in the context of family background (Pines, 2017).

The fourth quotation states that, “the ‘Cry of the Osprey’ expresses happiness without being licentious and expresses sorrow without slipping into unnecessary pathos”. It is another classic highlighted in the book of odes, and the interpretation depends on whether one thinks it is from the music of the Ode or it is from Ode I. The quotation explains how a gentleman is longing for a beautiful woman. However, the woman in context was the unknown subject of a folk song that grew up around the Odes, and she ended up with King Wen. Some people understand the message as one expressing joy without being promiscuous, expressing the sadness without falling into depression. The book of Odes highlights a perfect balance of emotion and restraint that depicts the characters of a man (Son, 2016).

The final quotation states, “whoever rules by the force of virtue is like the Pole Star: it only takes its place and is paid homage to the countless smaller stars.” The concept of the book of a document, the point of this passage was to be a model for the man who in wu-wei fashion, would quietly, naturally and consciously bring the world into order by the force of his perfect moral virtue, in natural peace brought about by Heaven in the natural world. As mentioned by Bao Xian, One who has a virtue is wu-wei, who-like the Polish Star-does not move and yet earns a tribute from the countless lesser stars (Zhou,2019).

General Approaches to Learning Religion

Scholars have developed three different ways of studying religion that is categorical or methodological, metaphysical and social-political. Categorical or methodological states that scientifically human beings lack knowledge about specific things and science avails itself to provide the information that is giving theory and not just correlational studies(Paloutzian, 2017). Metaphysical raises concerns about what is real and significant, while Socio-Political usually highlight religion as a relationship between social and political affairs. It states that separating society’s historical significance of religion and the metaphysical motivation is very hard since it considers both the anthropological and historical data.

The best way to adopt in learning religion is by use of the methodological approach, and this is because it is based on the scientific method that requires any findings should be left open for any dispute.  For example, If the interplay between faith and depression will be discussed, the hypothesis may be a religious depression, such as to feel weak, spiritual, and sad, by feeling something is in God’s hands. It allows one to do tests and research more based on the hypothesis. However, metaphysical, which is based on the reality and significance of religion culture, it may lead to one presuming that all members of the group share the importance and significance of a particular religious phenomenon (Dreamson, 2018). Thus becoming culturally sensitive may also be a challenge or even an impossibility to look with a certain naiveté in society.

Conclusion

To be able to understand religion clearly, one has to have an open mind to different ways of learning religion. One can consider metaphysical, which provides the reality of the society giving the philosophy in place and its significance. Moreover, after getting to know the philosophical nature of the religion, use the methodological way to get the theories around it and also test for the hypothesis to get the correct analogy.

References

Dreamson, N. (2018). Culturally inclusive global citizenship education: metaphysical and non-western approaches. Multicultural Education Review, 10(2), 75-93.

McGrath, A. E. (2020). Science & religion: a new introduction. John Wiley & SonsPaloutzian, R. (2017). Psychology of Religion in the World. Revista Pistis Praxis, 9(1), 15-30.

Pines, Y. (2017). Confucius’ elitism: The concepts of junzi and xiaoren revisited. A concise companion to Confucius, 164.

Son, B. N. (2016). Confucian Constitutionalism in East Asia. Routledge.

Zhou, Y. (2019). Creation of Traditional Cultural Curriculum: the Instruction of Analects. In Selected Essays on China’s Education: Research and Review, Volume 3 (pp. 1-45). Brill.